"Now don't you think, Sonny, that it didn't need some mighty fine work to do what Cap'n Eph's tellin' about so quiet-like," Mr. Peters interrupted. "There ain't another man on this whole coast who could have done the trick, an' I'm willin' to confess that my heart was in my mouth pretty much all the time." "Sammy did his full share of the work, Sonny, an' did it like a little man," the old keeper said, continuing his story as if there had not been any interruption. "The first time we ran down, the captain of the wrecked vessel tossed one of the men aboard us, for the poor fellow was so far gone he couldn't help himself. The second trip we got another passenger in the same way, an' the third venture, which was nigh bein' the last of our work, owin' to an ugly sea catchin' us when we were within four or five feet of the wreck, the other two men jumped aboard." "An' by that time we had a full cargo, I can tell you," Mr. Peters said, determined to relate his share of the story. "We had shipped a barrel of water while gettin' down there, an' when both the men jumped into the dory at the same minute, she had all any craft could swim under." "The two men who had life enough left in 'em to bear a hand, bailed the water out while Sammy an' I pulled at the oars the best we knew how," Captain Eph continued, "an' when she was lightened a bit, they got out the second pair of oars. Of course the wind helped us mightily, when we was homeward bound; but at the same time considerable work was needed to fetch her in safe. That's all there was to the rescue, Sonny, an' I reckon Sammy an' I are feelin' a good deal better than if we'd hung 'round here listenin' to the gun without liftin' a hand." "You're brave men, the bravest that ever lived, as Uncle Zenas said this forenoon," Sidney whispered, and Captain Eph looked up quickly at his second assistant as he asked sharply: "What right have you got to fill Sonny's head with sich stuff as that, Zenas Stubbs? I've seen you do plenty of bigger things in front of Petersburg, an' never yet felt called upon to say you was so terribly brave!" "It's nobody's business what I said to Sonny when you two idjuts was away," Uncle Zenas said snappishly. "I didn't tell him then what I will now--that you're both the most pig-headed, opinionated old shell-backs that ever wheedled the Government into appointin' 'em to the charge of a light-house!" Having thus expressed himself so forcibly, the cook went down-stairs as if suddenly attacked by a fit of the sulks, and Captain Eph whispered in Sidney's ear: "Now wouldn't you think he was a cross-grained old curmudgeon? Wa'al, he ain't, an' his heart is jest as big as his body. It's what you might call second nature for him to tear 'round when we don't get into the kitchen the very minute he has the food on the table; but, bless you, neither Sammy nor I pay any attention to what he says."